THE ROLE AND THE TASKS OF PSYCHOSOCIAL SP ECIALISTS WORKING IN PEDIATRIC HOSPITALS .1. MOTIVES AND PROBLEMS OF AN INTERDISCIPLINARY APPROACH

Nowadays, the core problems of psychosocial care of pediatric inpatien ts are those imposed by the chronically ill child and his family. In G ermany, these new and complex problems are supposed to be solved by in tegrating psychosocial specialists and developing a comprehensive, int erdisciplinary approach. The first part of this series discusses its p roblems and pitfalls. To find out their role in the complex network, t he new specialists misleadingly may define their task as exclusively d evoted to casework. The medical staff may perceive this as a kind of n eglect of its town psychosocial competencies. As a consequence, they w ill become suspicious of the new collegues, disregarding their potenti ally, too. Instead of a true cooperation, this may lead to a kind of f ragmentation of the professional network.